The Immigration and Asylum Office unlawfully rejected the claimant’s application for international protection. The court found that the authorities did not objectively assess the evidence and country information provided by the claimant, a Coptic Christian from Egypt. They also failed to correctly interpret the definition of a refugee in accordance with international law and disregarded the special status of the claimant who was an underage applicant.

Following the appeal of the Children’s Rights Ombudsman, the Supreme Administrative Court set aside the order of the Regional Administrative Court, in relation to a challenge to the decision of the Polish Refugee Board, and set aside the aforementioned decision to refuse tolerated stay, dismissing the appeal in all other respects.

The court justified its decision with reference to the procedural errors of the Polish Refugee Board, which included failing to gather evidence in an appropriate manner and inappropriately establishing the facts relating to the Applicant’s children....

An applicant may be granted refugee status under Article 1 of the 1951 Geneva Convention for fear of persecution based on sexual orientation. This depends on whether or not, according to the conditions prevailing in the country of origin, persons sharing a sexual orientation may be regarded as a social group within the meaning of the Convention.

The Immigration Rules (“the Rules”) minimum income requirements (“the MIR”) for individuals who have a right to live in the UK who wish to bring their non-EEA citizen spouses to live with them are not open to legal challenge.

The Rules fail unlawfully to give effect to the duty of the Secretary of State (“the SoS”) in respect of the welfare of children under s.55 of the Borders, Citizenship and Immigration Act 2009 (“the 2009 Act”), however the challenge to the validity of the Rules was dismissed.

To ensure that their decisions are compatible with the Human Rights Act...

Granting someone a refugee status for fear of persecution based on belonging to a social group due to his sexual orientation, cannot be linked to the fact that his sexual orientation has, or not, been made public. Indeed, a social group is instituted by how society perceive those in the group.

An individual applying for asylum does not have, in order to avoid persecutions in his country, to hide his sexual orientation.

In order to prove the risk of persecution, there is no requirement that belonging to a social group based on sexual orientation must be prohibited by any...

The applicant, a minor, an Afghan citizen, ethnic Pashtun and a Sunni Muslim from Chahar Dara district in Kunduz Province, feared if returned to Afghanistan he would be killed or forcibly recruited by the Taliban.

The Board notes that the applicant is 15 years old, Pashtun, illiterate and the eldest son of the family where the father was killed in 2015. Further, the Board notes that according to country of origin information it is credible that the Taliban recruits young men and boys in Chahar Dara.

With reference to the applicant being a minor and without a network the Board...

In this case, the Supreme Court allowed the State’s appeal against a High Court Judgment in which the Refugee Appeals Tribunal was found to have erred in law in its approach to determining persecution. The Supreme Court allowed the State’s appeal on the basis that the tribunal member’s finding of no risk of persecution was not unreasonable (within the applicable standards of judicial review) and that the High Court was incorrect in finding that the extent of educational discrimination at issue in this case met the threshold of persecution required.

This case dealt with the extent to which in the case of a child the prospect of discrimination could amount to a real risk of persecution sufficient to found a successful asylum claim in a situation where a comparably placed adult would not be at such a risk.

In the course of an asylum procedure, the statements of the asylum seeker have to be assessed integrally. This includes, inter alia, an analysis of (up-to-date) country reports. However, such analysis is not carried out in a sufficient manner where there are only superficial references to the country of origin information. Rather, it is required that the information contained is actually taken into consideration when taking the decision, applied to the specific circumstances of each case and compared to the information provided by the asylum seeker(s).

The Court of Appeal rejected a request rebutting the presumption of Turkey as a safe third country for a Syrian national of Armenian origin who resided there for one year and held a work permit, on the ground that general references to human rights violations and deficiencies in Turkey’s asylum system did not suffice to establish a real and individualised risk of persecution or indirect refoulement to Syria.